


Michael Guerin, Space Pirate

by Enchantable



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Friends to Lovers, Long-Distance Friendship, M/M, Rescue Missions, Texting, the martian au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-11
Updated: 2019-05-11
Packaged: 2020-02-29 21:28:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18786562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enchantable/pseuds/Enchantable
Summary: OPP: wait SatCom figured out i was alive. was that you?DSN: yesDSN: i saw the solar panels were clearOPP: and you thought that was me?DSN: i figured even you would clean if your life depended on it.





	Michael Guerin, Space Pirate

**B** eing stuck on the graveyard shift feels oddly appropriate.

He thinks Michael would have loved the irony of it.

Alex takes a long drink from his coffee. He watched the launch after it happened, in one of the staff break rooms. He didn’t think much of it, only the 3AM shift he had the next morning was on his mind. Now he wishes things were different. Not that he fully expected his high school fling to remember him, or to realize that he was working for NASA as well. Alex is in SatCom, he monitors their satellites. Eyes in the sky, some people call him, but he likes to think of himself as an Interplanetary Voyeur. Most of his education and training goes to waste. He didn’t mind it when he felt like he was a part of something bigger than himself, making sure that everyone got home safely. 

Now when he looks at the red planet, all he thinks is how Michael finally got his wish. 

Michael always wanted to be part of something bigger. He also wanted to get the hell off the planet. Alex remembers their endless conversations about it, laying under the real stars when they could and the fake, tacked on stars when they couldn’t. Michael found his way off the planet. And was the most popular astronaut to boot. He was the only one surprised at that. Alex saw his face everywhere. Each time it kicked up a gut punch of emotions. Mostly now it was a sadness that was far too familiar when it came to him, to them—now though there was a finality to it. The idea that Michael would be bones on Mars and the only way Alex would ever see him was in old footage was borderline incomprehensible. For the moment Alex let himself not think about it and focus instead on his job. The storm had cleared and he focused on what they could see. It was highly unlikely they would ever see Michael’s body, the dust storm would have buried him. But Alex hopes he does. Michael deserves that closure.

Taking another hit of caffeine, he turns to scrolling through the pictures and cataloguing things that have shifted in the dust. He frowns and zooms in towards the HAB. Alex refines the pictures, teasing out a clearer image. He can picture the conversation in his head, he knows the exact arguments. He brings up the images from the past few days. The way things have shifted does not line up with what is in front of him. The solar panels should be completely covered, but they are clean. Spotless, or as spotless as anything gets on Mars. He looks again and triple checks just to make sure. The chance is impossibly slim. But his hand is already reaching for his phone. He thumbs in the number for security.

“I need the emergency contact number for Dr. Kapoor,” He says, “this is Alex Manes in SatCom.”

“Are you sure it’s an emergency?” The bored voice asks. Alex isn’t sure of anything at the moment.

“Yes,” He says instead.

The head of the mission is wildly above his pay grade and Alex has been raised to respect the chain of command. Why his violations of it seem intrinsically linked to Michael Guerin is something he doesn’t have the capacity to figure out at the moment. Not after the phone rings twice and he hears the man on the other end clear his throat. God, he’s woken his boss up at 3:35 am. 

“Hello?”

“Hi, sir, this is Alex Manes in SatCom,” he says, “I think Michael Guerin is alive,” there is a distinct bang and a groan, a whispered apology and the sound of feet moving, “the solar panels are clean.”

“And you’re sure it’s not the wind?”

“Yes, sir,” he says, glancing up at the screen as the next round of images come through. He almost drops the phone, “sir, the Rover has moved.”

“What?!”

“The rover moved,” he says, scrambling to look at the photos again, “the solar panels are clean and the rover has moved.”

“I’ll be there shortly.”

* * *

Fuck. Mars.

Fuck it so hard.

Michael is over this planet. He wants off. Why he can’t find a planet he wants to stay on is beyond him and now definitely is not the time for those deep philosophical questions. He’s got more pressing issues like making sure the hole in his gut closes without infection, finding a way to supplement his food and, oh yeah, contact earth. 

“Look, I’m not upset about being left behind,” he tells the log, “that’s protocol. What pisses me off is the fact that I’m doing everyone’s homework,” he shakes his head, “here’s my new universal constant: a group project will always end with one person doing all the work. We’ll call it Guerin’s Law.”

He has an idea for contacting earth. The problem is that it rides on earth knowing he’s contacting them. He’s got no idea if anyone has even figured out he’s alive. He doubts it. But there’s a chance. He knew it was bullshit but he had an affection for the dramatic Rover that gave it’s dying words and sang itself a birthday song every year. Michael has had plenty of those birthdays. And of course when he’s already doing everyone’s work, he now has to do the extra credit and pull off the save. If he doesn’t get an A, he’s fucking suing. He looks in the camera, aware this could be his last message.

“Captain Evans,” He says, “none of this is your fault, I forgive you for everything if that’s what you need to hear,” his solemn face turns deadly, “but if this doesn’t work and I die listening to your alarmingly inclusive Donna Summer, I will turn your life into the karaoke bar from hell.”

Seems like a good note to go out on.

Summer eat your heart out.

* * *

Alex looks over the chart again.

And again.

The spotlight is nerve wracking. They have established Michael is alive, but they don’t have a way of communicating. He knows Michael is trying to figure something out and everyone is scrambling to find it. He also knows he has an advantage. It’s been years, so many thing have changed, but he’s got a good idea of how Michael’s mind works. He follows the paths the Rover is making and connects the dots before anyone else. 

“Opportunity?”

“It lines up,” he says, “he’s going for the Rover.” 

“Let me make some calls.”

Thankfully the Opportunity team is largely still around. By the time Michael gets  it up and working, they are ready. The images come in and patch together. Alex is awake for twenty hours straight but he’s there when the images come in. Michael standing in front of two signs and holding a third. Alex’s heart leaps into his throat and it’s got nothing to do with the truly staggering amount of coffee he has consumed. A cheer goes up and he sits down before his knees can do anything like buckle. Michael’s face is just visible. Alex can make out a single curl that’s half escaped from his cap and it’s always the little things. Michael is alive. They point the camera towards the ‘yes’ sign and the next image is blurry but only because he’s jumping up and down. He’s got no back up supplies and he’s jumping up and down.

Alex thinks he might be the one who dies in all of this.

* * *

OPP: Huston we had a problem.

DSN: Good to hear from you. 

OPP: You have no idea.

* * *

So the communications issue is more or less resolved which is awesome. And he’s saved Opportunity. Which makes him even more awesome. All around it’s awesome. Except Isobel still thinks he’s dead which is less than ideal. So he’s in a little trouble on that one. But he would trade everything for her to yell at him. Not that he’s got a lot to trade. 

OPP: hey, DSN whose babysitting me tonight?

DSN: SatCom

OPP: no shit

DSN: language

OPP: fuck

OPP: whose babysitting? got a name?

DSN: alex

OPP: i’m michael

DSN: i know

OPP: does this mean i’m super famous? think i can get free fries at the mess?

DSN: no it’s alex. from high school.

Michael is literally on a different planet but he jumps anyway and twists around like he’s being spied on. Alex was a punk kid who, okay, he may have been slightly in love with. But his homophobic dick of a dad ended that. He may have crossed Michael’s mind a few times, but never enough to do something like look him up and see that they worked for the same place. For some reason he feels more comforted by this news than he has by almost anything else. Except maybe that people knew he was alive at all. 

OPP: no fucking way. i thought you said you were joining the Air Force.

DSN: i did. then I went to grad school and joined NASA. 

OPP: wait SatCom figured out i was alive. was that you?

DSN: yes

DSN: i saw the solar panels were clear

OPP: and you thought that was me?

DSN: i figured even you would clean if your life depended on it.

Michael snorts, it’s not like he’s had much to clean back when he knew Alex. He was living in his truck. But when he thinks about his desk at NASA—okay it is a mess. He can admit that. It blows his mind that Alex has been here the whole time. That Alex figured out he was alive. He tries to reconcile the idea of who he remembers with whoever found him. But all he can picture is the kid who unknowingly saved his life more times than he can count. More times plus one, if he thinks about it. Probably plus more to come, if things keep going this way. 

OPP: do you still have that septum ring?

DSN: go to sleep

OPP: come on, do you? 

DSN: no

OPP: too bad, I thought it was kind of hot.

DSN: bed, michael

OPP: yes dad

* * *

DSN: please do not call me ‘dad’, they are reviewing these

OPP: ok daddy

* * *

Captain Isobel Evans reads the message several times to be sure. Then she gathers everyone together. She’s thought she was a good leader this whole time, focusing on getting the crew that was still alive back home even though the only thing she wanted to do was cry over the loss of her crew member. She runs the scenario over and over again. But it remains the same. There was no other choice. Now she doesn’t know what to think when she has to tell them. It’s only Max she looks at when she speaks. 

  
“Michael’s alive.”

Pandemonium erupts from the others but Max stares at her. His own horror and guilt reflect hers. Michael is alive but he’s on another planet. Michael’s alive but who knows for how long. She made the call to leave him, but as the ship’s doctor he made the call that he was probably dead. They are both culpable and innocent, but Isobel blames herself more than anyone. She should have given the order to wait, no matter the risks. They all scramble over to the communications screen. Kyle gets there first because it is, after all, his chair. He refers to it as his ship too. Then again he is the one who flies it. 

HRMS: sorry we left you on mars, we just don’t like you that much. 

OPP: assholes

OPP: hows the cptn?

HRMS: we’re all good. how are you?

OPP: bored af

OPP: look. boobies ( . Y . )

HRMS: michael!

That night Max sits hunched over in his bunk, arms wrapped around himself. He never should have said that Michael was dead. But he and Isobel have been running over everything. But now it turns out Michael is alive and he can’t fathom what it must be like for him to be back there alone. Did he know that they would learn he was alive? Did he think he would die there a second time and no-one would know? The thoughts are horrible and each occurs to him in rapid succession until he thinks they might drive him crazy.

“Hey,” Liz slips into his pod, “how are you holding up?”

“I told Iz there was no way,” he says, “he’s been there the whole time and i had no idea—“ he stares at her, aware he is asking for answers she doesn’t have, “what if he dies there? How is he going to spend four years there until we launch another mission?” 

“He’s going to be fine,” she says, cradling his face in her hands. He ignores the rules, the fraternization line they always dance around and leans into her touch, “he’ll be okay and soon you will laugh about this,” she smiles, “after you buy him all the vodka on earth.”

“I’ll buy him whatever he wants, as long as we get him back.”

* * *

OPP: alex

OPP: ALEX

DSN: i’m sorry, Alex has been transferred to SatCon.

OPP: GO GET HIM

Huddled in the Rover, Michael forces his breathing to be steady. He cannot afford for something else to go wrong. Behind him, the HAB stands as a shell, blown when he failed to pressurize it correctly. It broke. He broke it. His crops are gone and he feels like crying. Which is not going to help. He can’t panic. He can’t flip out. He wants Max and Isobel and his pod on the ship that’s getting farther away with each second. Mostly he wants the person on earth whose his lifeline in this. He forces himself to look away from the screen. Maybe Alex is asleep somewhere. Maybe he’s just as fed up with his bullshit as he was in college. Michael grips the chair. No, no he is not giving into his abandonment issues because he’s literally the only person on a planet and his only friend won’t answer the phone. Mars is his planet and he refuses to have them go down like this. 

DSN: michael what happened?

“Thank you Martian God,” he breathes

OPP: the hab depressurized 

OPP: i’m ok. crops are gone. all of its gone.

DSN: you’re ok. thats the main thing.

OPP: says the guy with seamless at his fingertips

DSN: i told you you were going to have to learn to cook one day

Michael laughs despite everything. And okay maybe it ends in a sob, but just one. Alex throwing shade like they’re texting and this isn’t a life or death situation makes him feel so much better. He knows Alex is probably hyperaware of being watched but he’s still willing to do it. Michael knows it shouldn’t be a big deal but he’s alone on a planet. The only person who can judge him is in a mirror and he sure as hell doesn’t bring one of those on the rover. 

DSN: michael are you there?

OPP: i’m there i’m just outraged

OPP: i am an extraordinary boiler

DSN: do i want curly or regular fries with this sandwich?

OPP: asshole

OPP: thanks

DSN: hang in there

* * *

Maria Deluca, astrodynamicist extraordinaire figures it out. 

She checks her math, swears loudly and breaks her almost new piece of chalk. Guerin is a planet away and he still manages to ruin her love life for at least—ugh—another year. Asshole. Why couldn’t he have just stayed on the ground with Alex like he wanted to? She writes out her calculations and tells the mission heads. Then she does the right thing and hides the info in the latest data dump for the ship, knowing her wife and her bff will figure it out.

That evening she finds Alex in SatCon. 

He looks awful and she feels the same annoyance at Guerin. They’ve both slept with him and she might have had feelings for the mop haired cowboy at one point, but Guerin is good at leaving and being so focused on one thing that he fails to see anything else. Like an unhappy boyfriend or girlfriend. She sits next to Alex and hands him a cup of coffee. 

“Any word from the space cowboy?”

“His food supplies are ok but the rations are getting to him,” he says, “part of its mental but the rest—“ he shakes his head, “he shouldn’t have to deal with his issues up there.”

Michael was food insecure for most of his childhood. He’s good at functioning on limited calories but he’s also scared of not getting his next meal. The fact that Alex remembers that makes Maria want to hug him. She settles for sighing and shaking her head at the situation. All of NASA has been reading their back and forth. For science. The fact that it reads increasingly like a romance novel is definitely not important. And people definitely aren’t taking sides. She doesn’t have a Team Alex t shirt like some people. Just a baseball cap. 

“He’ll be okay,” she says.

Alex nods wordlessly but his eyes are glued to the screen where their communications occur. She nudges him. 

“Say hi,” She says. 

“I can’t. He needs to focus.”

“You can still say hi,” she says. 

“It’s a waste of resources.”

Rolling her eyes at men and their excuses she nudges his chair out of the way and gets at the keyboard.

DSN: hi

“Maria!”

Ten seconds later the reply come.

OPP: hey i was just about to message you

OPP: you miss me that much?

“Maria—“ Alex tries for the keyboard.

DSN: always

Alex grabs it finally.

DSN: adokfjosiaf

OPP: you ok?

DSN: sorry. yes. 

OPP: good. i miss you too.

Alex sucks in a breath and Maria grins. It’s almost almost worth another year with her wife. Not quite but almost. Alex gulps and stares at the message. His fingers hover over the keyboard as he hesitates, swamped by an insecurity Maria has seen before. She looks between him and the keyboard, sending every mental signal she has to him. 

DSN: keep going and we can see each other again

OPP: dunno, you could always come to Mars 

OPP: visit me

DSN: I like earth 

OPP: you’re making this song way too relevant 

DSN: what are you listening to?

OPP: I would do anything for love

“That is my song,” Maria says, “my song with my wife.”

“She’ll be back soon,” Alex offers.

Maria hates them both.

* * *

“This is a mutiny,” Isobel says, “we all need to participate and we all need to agree. Kyle and I know the consequences. We’re military. But the rest of you need to understand this could mean the end of your careers. They might not let any of you fly again,” she says, “it also means another year without your families. There isn’t any shame in wanting to go home. We do it together or not at all.”

“No one gets left behind if we can get them,” Kyle says, “I might be flying this thing but I am still a doctor. Do no harm. I vote we go back.”

“Michael is my brother,” Max says. 

“My family is here,” Liz tells them, gripping Max’s hand, “let’s do it.”

* * *

“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” Jenna, their long suffering media relations director says.

“The Hermes is in the middle of an unsanctioned maneuver to slingshot themselves back to Mars using earth’s gravity as an assist.”

“So a mutiny,” she says, “you want me to put out a press release that says a bunch of astronauts turned space pirates have performed a mutiny?”

“Actually it’s Guerin who would asked to be referred to as a space pirate, since he is technically commandeering a vehicular over international territory.”

She sighs. It’s too early for a migraine. 

“I hate everyone in this room.”

* * *

DSN: michael

DSN:  michael update me

DSN: GUERIN

DSN: captain blonde beard, do you copy?

OPP: CBB: i copy. everything’s good

DSN: you are taking this way too far

OPP: CBB: that’s kind of judgmental for someone whose not a space pirate

OPP: CBB: if you were here id make you walk the plank. by that i mean solar panel

DSN: find water and maybe it’ll work

OPP: CBB: i have to starve, become a pirate, now i gotta find water too?

OPP: CBB: anything else?

DSN: come home 

OPP: CBB: only because I want to, not because you’re making me

* * *

He modified the ship like they tell him but until he’s in there,  he doesn’t feel so great about sitting there. Not until his radio crackles to life with the first human voice he’s heard in over a year.

“Guerin, do you copy?”

“Iz!” His voice breaks around the syllable of her name.

“Michael, oh thank god,” she says. Isobel has had her game face on this whole mission, hearing the relief makes the tears break free, “we’re launching you, strap in.”

“Tell Valenti to be careful,” he says.

“I got you, Guerin,” Kyle says, “you ready to come home?”

God that sounds so nice. 

“I don’t know, it’s kind of nice having this all to myself,” he chokes out.

“We got you, hang tight.”

He blacks out. 

When he comes to, the ship is too far away. He can hear the swearing. It’s bad. He takes a deep breath and refuses to give in to the panic. The side door opens and he sees Isobel coming towards him. Max is on the side of the ship. His family is there. 

“I’m going Iron Man,” he says, punching a hole in his hand.

“Michael!”

He aims himself as best he can and propels towards Isobel. She reaches and just when he thinks this isn’t going to work, they collide. They lurch violently to the side but she locks her arms and legs around him and snaps a carabiner to the front of his suit. The lead connecting them snaps taut and for a moment he’s sure it failed. He’s dead in space. But he blinks several time and nothing has changed. The relief shatters him in a way he didn’t know was possible and Isobel lets out the best laugh he’s ever heard in his life.

“I got him!” She calls and everyone erupts into cheers, “I got you,” she says.

“You have terrible taste in music,” he tells her. 

They reel them in. The only possible reason he would let go of her is to throw his arms around his brother. Max clutches him and Isobel together as the hatch seals and the chamber pressurizes. Michael collapses against his siblings who take his weight immediately, undoing his helmet. Their voice goes into his ears, no radio or texts. But the first human hands that touch him belong to a friend.

“Mikey!” He’s not even mad about the nickname as she hugs him and then works on getting the suit off him.

“Liz! Get me—“

“On it.”

She gets him out and then Max and Isobel are there. Kyle and Liz fall with them and it’s a big pile of tears and hugs and laughter and snot. He doesn’t care. The pile make their way to the comms to message that they have him. Unwilling to let go of each other even though Michael is very aware that he needs a shower.  

CMMND: good work! Come home.

* * *

 Alex has his last 3AM shift the night before they get back. Maria keeps him company. She suggests that he come with her to the families area but he turns her down. He’s not family. His boss insists he come with him to the command center. He watches the ship land. When he sees Michael pop out, throw down his helmet like he made a touchdown and throw his hands up, he feels like the breath he’s been holding for the six months it’s taken to get back to earth can finally be released. Michael is okay. Everyone is okay.  He staggers from the room.

“I’m gonna just—five minutes,” he says. He’s woken up every night certain the news will come in that Michael is dead. He has to go to a second funeral. Michael is fine. He’s dizzyingly exhausted with the thought. He drops onto the couch. It will be hours before he sees him. “Five minutes,” he tells himself and closes his eyes.

He wakes up to the smell of hazelnut coffee. 

He opens his eyes, already knowing what he’s going to see. All the ways he thought about this going, Michael crouching there in a NASA onesie with his hair wet and two cups of coffee isn’t it. Alex carefully sits up, afraid that this is a dream. But Michael stays every time he blinks. When he’s sitting, Michael holds out the coffee cup. 

“A small token of my—“ 

Alex throws himself into his arms. The coffee goes flying as Michael bands his arms around him, equally tight. Two years of text messages sent through a Rover and suddenly all of their other senses are flooding with each other. Alex never wants to let go of him and he can feel Michael trembling against him. Their faces are buried in each other necks and he’s never been so glad they are the same height. 

“Thank you, thank you,” Michael breathes into his neck and Alex clutches him closer.

“This was all you.”

“It wouldn’t have been if you hadn’t seen me.”

They pull back enough just enough to look at each other, taking in the differences. The reports all say how driven Michael has been with his recovery and Alex has been pushing harder at his own pt. In that moment he doesn’t think that it matters. He doesn’t care what either of them look like or what state they are in. He just wants Michael here. Michael presses his lips together, his eyes dragging to his lips. After everything, there’s something he immediately recognizes. 

“You’re not seeing anyone,  are you?” He says.

“No, this really infuriating guy named Captain Blonde Beard keeps texting me at 3am.”

Michael is still laughing when he kisses him. 

This, Alex thinks, is more than worth the wait. 


End file.
